Tongue Stuck in Bottle
Location: Clayton, North Carolina Date: May 6, 1995 Story On the evening of May 6, 1995, in Clayton, North Carolina, Terry Eastman was making dinner for her sister, Tammy, ten-year-old daughter, Amanda, and five-year-old son, Matthew. The children were playing outside, and Terry asked them to come in and eat. She started to serve her visiting family some spaghetti, and told Amanda to stop playing with a glass bottle. She started to giggle when she knew she shouldn't be doing it and it got stuck on her tongue. "I tried to pull it off myself, but it wouldn't budge," said Tammy. Terry could see that Amanda's tongue was stretched and tried to pull the bottle off, but it wouldn't budge. "Her tongue was starting to turn blue. I didn't know what else to do other than to call the rescue squad," said Terry. Amanda began panicking, sweating, and drooling because she could not swallow. Matthew started crying, because he thought they might have to cut off Amanda's tongue. Terry escorted him out of the kitchen. Volunteers with the Clayton area rescue squad, including EMT Misty Sassman were presented with Amanda's predicament as soon as they arrived. "When the patient's mom said that her daughter's tongue was stuck in a glass bottle, I said 'Excuse me, could you repeat that?'" said Misty. She tried to use a bobby pin to get the bottle off, but it didn't work. Amanda was taken to Johnson Memorial Hospital where she was examined by the emergency physician on duty. "It didn't seem like the hospital had any kind of tongue specialist," said Terry. ENT surgeon Daniel Katz was called in. "We knew that we had to get the bottle off as quickly as possible because its neck was choking off the blood supply, meaning there's a risk that her tongue could possibly die," said Dr. Katz. He told Terry that they had to take Amanda to the operating room in order to take care of her problem and needed some help because he was not trained in working with glass. David Johnson, who owned a glass company in town, was called in to help remove the bottle. The surgeons called him over and gloved him. "My biggest concern was that it might break wrong and actually break into her tongue," said David. He used special tools to get it off and used the freezer spray which was nice and cold. "The back end broke off and the fluid came out. I tapped it again and it opened up, releasing like a flower pedal. In a few minutes, her tongue began to pink up," said Dr. Katz. Once the bottle came off, David saw everybody smiling. Although Amanda has stopped drinking from bottles, she suffered no lasting effects from the incident. "I'm really happy that David was able to get the bottle off because I could have been walking around with it on my tongue for the rest of my life," said Amanda. When she came back home, Matthew gave her a big hug and kiss. She and Terry gave David a glass bottle with flowers in it and a big hug. "He'll always have a special place in mine and Amanda's heart," said Terry. David was just glad to help and able to become a surgeon. Category:1995 Category:North Carolina Category:Glass Category:Entrapment Category:Humorous Rescues